Rip, Torn, Tumble
by Vain
Summary: Seifer/Squall. When old family secrets refuse to stay buried, Squall has to come and save the day. Again. The only problem is: Who is going to save him?
1. Prologue: Little Things Kill

**Rip, Torn, Tumble**

**(_straight__ into me_****)__**

~ Vain  9.4.2002

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I **do not own Squall Leonhart, Seifer Almsay or any of the other characters in the game _Final Fantasy VIII; they belong to _****Squaresoft and their respective creators.  The story and its concepts are mine. **

Please be forewarned that this story contains spoilers, yoai, shounen-ai, mature themes, and violence.  _Translation: stuff you won't see until you finish the game, fighting, swearing, angst, Seifer/Squall man-love, and a dab of NCS.  Get over it or go away.  _

The only profit I get from this is emotional satisfaction, so please **read and review.  Thank you.**

~Vain

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**Prologue**

**Little Things Kill**

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**"We are a killing society, awash with violence."**

- Professor Austin Stuart

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His heavy boot made no sound as he crossed the office at a lazy, unhurried pace.  The thick red carpet had soaked up most of the blood and the others were in the hall making sure there would be no more resistance.  He wasn't all that worried; he was SeeD, after all.

The corpulent man behind the desk cringed back into his chair and let lose a whimpering noise that anyone else most likely would have found sickening.  The young man in leather simply shrugged it off and continued to advance on his "employer" silently.

The fat man, a self-styled dictator called Hokitawa, twisted inelegantly in his chair.  "Who are you?!"  His voice cracked with fear as the man-childe he had thought to be nothing more than a sullen intern walked slowly towards him.  "Why are you doing this?!"

This time the young man did sneer, a slight twitch of his upper lip, before his customarily unflappable expression returned.  He spoke with soft, clipped words and an almost imperceptible accent, the voice of an educated man, as he reached behind him to grasp the hilt of the enormous blade that was strapped across his back.  "You don't watch TV very often, do you?"  He sounded almost amused, but his storm gray eyes were flat and indifferent.  The blade—a gunblade, the other man realized belatedly—sang as it slid out of its sheath.

The pudgy man swallowed and his watery blue eyes danced in terror as his former intern stopped in front of his desk.  "Please . . ."

Squall leveled the gunblade at the man expressionlessly.  "It's just business, you understand.  Nothing personal."

And the SeeD High Commander pulled the trigger.

Lionheart jerked slightly with the powerful kick of release as Mr. Hokitawa's rather ample frame exploded out of the back of his plush chair.  Squall's eyes closed, the man's expression burnt into his mind.  He lowered the tip of Lionheart to the soft, bloodstained carpet and leaned heavily on the hilt, his pointer finger lightly brushing the trigger.  Pointblank range with a gunblade didn't leave too much left of a person, even one as large as Hokitawa.  He stayed that way for a moment, eyes closed; face slightly twisted in a dark frown, and silky hair falling into his eyes.

His radio beeped.  _"Commander?"_

He inhaled deeply and then sighed when all he could taste in the air was blood.

_"Commander?"___

The young man growled silently and yanked the small radio out of his belt with unnecessary violence.  "The mark has been eliminated," he said calmly into the transmitter.  "Pack up and let's go home."

There was a crackle of static, almost immediately followed by Quistis's voice.  "Yes, sir."  
  


Leather gloved hands returned the small radio to his side and he looked around the vacant-feeling, blood spattered office where he had spent the past two weeks undercover with empty, expressionless eyes.  Then he turned sharply on his heel and walked out of the room without a backwards glance.

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	2. The Price of Shelter

**Rip, Torn, Tumble**

**(_straight__ into me_****)__**

~ Vain  9.4.2002

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I **do not own Squall Leonhart, Seifer Almsay or any of the other characters in the game _Final Fantasy VIII; they belong to _****Squaresoft and their respective creators.  The story and its concepts are mine. **

Please be forewarned that this story contains spoilers, yoai, shounen-ai, mature themes, and violence.  _Translation: stuff you won't see until you finish the game, fighting, swearing, angst, Seifer/Squall man-love, and a dab of NCS.  Get over it or go away.  _

The only profit I get from this is emotional satisfaction, so please **read and review.  Thank you.**

~Vain

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**Chapter One**

**The Price of Shelter**

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**"I was winning till I lost."**

- Chris Lesko

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_"I had sex with him."  _

_The words took the other man by surprise.  Blue-violet eyes narrowed and his customary drawl was forgotten in his shock.  "I beg your pardon?"_

_"I had sex with him."_

_"When?"___

_"D-District."___

_"Why?"_

_". . . He wanted it."_

_For a moment they were both silent, their former good mood irrevocably shattered._

_"Did **you want it?"**_

_There was no response._

_"Did he force you?  What did he do to you?"_

_". . ."_

_A whisper: "Answer me!"_

_"Let it be."_

_"What?!__  You can't be serious!  You have to talk to someone, tell someone what—"_

_"Nothing happened, so just drop it."  Gray eyes hardened.  "That is not a request."_

_". . . Hyne damn you, bastard."_

*---------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~----------*

Irvine Kinneas stared into space, his eyes narrowed as he rolled the events of the last mission over in his mind.  He scowled darkly.  He didn't know whether to scream or cry or just take out his Exeter and start shooting people.  None of these things were optional, though, so he just sat at their customary table in the cafeteria and thought.  

He knew he wouldn't come down to eat with them unless Quistis forced him to.  He thought maybe he knew why now.  There were still pieces of the puzzle that the sniper had yet to find, but Irvine was patient.  He could outwait Hyne himself if necessary, let alone the Ice Prince.

"So?"

"So?"

The resident ray of sunshine that was Selphie Tilmitt dropped into a chair and then beamed at Irvine from across the round table before tearing savagely into a croissant.  She chewed noisily before swallowing.  "How'd the mission go?"

Irvine grunted and took a sip of the thick sludge that was currently masquerading as Garden café mocha.  "Okay."

"Okay?"  The small mercenary across from him made a comical face of annoyance.  "Just okay?  It was a _big payoff.  I mean, Commander Squally himself went undercover with you for this one and it was just okay?"  Selphie blinked as though something had just occurred to her and the croissant stopped halfway to her mouth.  "How is he?  I mean . . . y'know.  With everything."_

The cowboy peered up at her below the bill of his hat and frowned before taking another sip of coffee.  "Still got that stick lodged as far up his ass as ever."  Violet eyes met brown ones intently.  "And Rinoa?"

Selphie shrugged unhappily.  "I dunno.  She just doesn't talk to me anymore—at least not about Squall.  Whatever happened between them remains a mystery."

A tray slammed down on the table and Selphie jumped, startled.  Irvine stabbed a piece of sausage before it could leap off his plate as Zell Dincht flopped gracelessly into the chair next to him.

The blond groaned and scrubbed his face.  "I am _so fucking **tired right now . . ."**_

Irvine took a nice fortifying swig of coffee.  Zell and Selphie . . . together . . . at 06:45 . . . Hyne save him now.

Selphie turned a stunningly guileless gaze onto the martial artist.  "When did you guys get in?"

"Three hours ago."  Blue eyes shone pleadingly as Zell stared at the girl in front of him.  "_Three __hours . . . It's inhuman.  How on earth does Squall function like this?"_

"Stress keeps him awake, I think," Selphie replied cheerily.

Zell groaned and Irvine slammed the coffee cup back on his tray so hard it spilled over onto his gloves.

"Irvie . . . ?"  Selphie's eyes widened as the man pushed himself to his feet and grabbed his tray without a word.  "Irvine?"

The cowboy stalked off stiffly, shoulders pulled back unnaturally tight and his long auburn hair shimmering in the florescent lights.  

Selphie turned to Zell.  "What happening?"

The blond shrugged and scowled down at his eggs.  "How should I know?  First Squall starts clamming up again, then he and Rinoa start screaming at each other in the cafeteria, then Irvine starts acting all weird three days into the mission."

Delicate fingers tore nervously at the remainders of her croissant as Selphie's brow darkened in an unusually thoughtful expression.  "You think this has something to do with Squall?"

"Mmm-hmm."  Zell picked up his Styrofoam cup of tea and swirled the reddish liquid around before his blue eyes flickered up to Selphie.  "Irvine was still a little bummed about the whole "Let's-Just-Be-Friends" Bomb you dropped on him last month when he took the mission," he didn't see her soft frown and continued, "but Quisty . . . You know how she can be.  I guess she thought that the two of them could somehow cheer each other up, y'know?  And for a little while it worked.  I mean, Hell, if the Lionheartless isn't talking to me, then he isn't talking to _anyone.  We were . . . __are . . . close.  But I wasn't making a dent.  So Quistis and I figured that maybe the cowboy could take him out . . . Get him laid . . . I dunno.  Do __something."  He took a deep swallow of the tea and frowned._

"And?" the young woman pressured.

"And for about a day things looked good.  We saw Squall and, okay, so he wasn't exactly dancing around with glee and all, but he looked better.  Better than he has since maybe we got back from the war.  And Irvine . . . Well, Irvine is Irvine.  Always a smile and a wink.  We didn't contact them for two weeks while Squall worked his way up to Hokitawa.  Then when we get the call, Squall's all stern and stiff.  We figure: "what the hell," because the High Commander never takes a fucking day off, right?  Then after things go down and we meet for debriefing, Irvine walks in looking like someone just blew up his puppy and mailed the pieces to him.  And Squall . . . He's fucking _ice, Selph.  Worse than he ever was before."_

The girl settled back in her uncomfortable plastic chair and sighed unhappily.  She took a half-hearted chomp of her croissant again.  "We could try a party . . .?"

"You tried that, remember?"  The blond turned to watch some students file in for breakfast.  "That was when Quistis decided that having Squall and Rinoa anywhere within 1000 meters of one another was out."

The petite girl sighed.  "That was my fault.  I kept trying to push them together.  But I never thought—"

Zell waved a dismissive hand.  "None of us thought that they'd react like that.  All of us kept trying to get them together again."  He took a bite of one of the hotdogs on his tray and chewed thoughtfully.  "You know when this all started, right?"

"What?"

Zell took another bite and a deep swallow of tea before continuing.  "Quisty and I were talking before the mission."  His eyes caught Selphie's and seemed to glow.  "The funeral.  He and Rinoa argued over it for weeks."

"Mmmm . . ." Selphie's forehead scrunched up in concentration.  "I remember.  It was weird.  He didn't say anything when they found the body, but you know how Squall is . . . You'd be better off trying to read glass.  You think he's being all gloomy and doomy because he misses Seifer?"

The blond shrugged.  "Dunno.  Could be."

"I thought they hated each other."

Zell made a face before finishing off his hotdog.  "Most _everyone hated Seifer.  There weren't too many people who were ambivalent towards him."  He picked up his second hotdog and took a bite._

"'Ambivalent?' " The girl quirked an eyebrow and Zell stuck his tongue out at her.   "Hmph."  Still smirking, Selphie finished off her croissant.  "Well, considering that Seifer's pretty dead, that really doesn't help us.  Maybe he'll just snap out of it?"

"And maybe Irvine will declare celibacy and Seifer will rise from the grave and return bearing gifts."  Zell took an enormous bite out of his hotdog.  

Selphie pouted.  "Well you don't have to be a jerk about it."

"Sorry."  He winced slightly and looked sheepish.  "I'm just tired."

The girl shrugged and stood.  

"Where you running off to?"

"I need chocolate.  You want anything?"

"Nah.  I have to hurry up and finish.  Squall ordered Nida to set course for Esthar the minute we got back to Garden.  We should be there in an hour or two and I wanna unwind on some 'Rexaurs in the Training Center before the briefing."  
  


Selphie sighed and tugged the tip of on of her braids speculatively.  "What's that all about, anyway?"

Zell shrugged.  "He immediately rat-holed himself in his quarters last night to put in a call to Laguna.  He and his dad ain't exactly buddy-buddy, so if Squall needed to call him and the whole Garden is going there instead of just a couple of us, it must be pretty important."  He stood.  "See you at the brief?"

"Yah."

He picked up his tray and headed towards the doors, leaving Selphie alone to await Quistis.

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	3. A Little Life In Yet

**Rip, Torn, Tumble**

**(_straight__ into me_****)__**

~ Vain  9.4.2002

*------------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~-------------*

I **do not own Squall Leonhart, Seifer Almsay or any of the other characters in the game _Final Fantasy VIII; they belong to _****Squaresoft and their respective creators.  The story and its concepts are mine. **

Please be forewarned that this story contains spoilers, yoai, shounen-ai, mature themes, and violence.  _Translation: stuff you won't see until you finish the game, fighting, swearing, angst, Seifer/Squall man-love, and a dab of NCS.  Get over it or go away.  _

The only profit I get from this is emotional satisfaction, so please **read and review.  Thank you.**

~Vain

*------------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~-------------*

**Chapter Two**

**A Little Life In Yet**

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**"Who is right and who is wrong?  No one!**

**But if you are alive—live: tomorrow you'll die as I might have died an hour ago.  ******

**And is it worth tormenting oneself, **

**when**** one only has a moment in comparison with eternity?"**

- Leo Tolstoy

War and Peace

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I have lived my entire life in a state of confusion.  The world spins through space 18.5 miles per second, steadily passing me by and leaving me frozen in its exhaust.  And they don't understand it at all.  I am the High Commander.  The Slayer of Sorceresses.  I am the Lion of Belamb—_The SeeD.  I see beyond the obvious, lead in times when other men would have fallen on their knees and wept.  I walked into hell and expected nothing in return but a slow death._

So they say.  They don't understand at all.

I have never held all the answers, nor boldly led the way into anything.  If anything, I was the least sure of all of them.  They had me to look to—or blame, although I don't think they'd have ever done it—and they did so without hesitation.  I had no one.  Well, no one left to look to.  Sis.  My mother.  Laguna.  Edea.  Cid. They all left me in some way or another—averted their eyes from my face.  I didn't care.

I got better everyday.  I would be okay without them.  I tried really hard.  I would be just fine by myself.

But I'm not.  

And the memory of them—of _him—is eating me alive.  His flashing green eyes.  __(Mocking me.__  Loving me.)  His strong, calloused hands.  __(Holding me down.)  His laughter, suddenly so cruel.  __(Owning me.)  His scent—pine and gun oil and sparks.  __(Marking me.__  Suffocating me.)  Almost like Irvine's, but like steel and fire where Irvine's is water and mint._

"Squall?  Squall?  Are you even listening to me?"

Rinoa's coffee brown eyes are like little chips of amber as they bore into me from the other side of my desk and I want to shudder.  My face hardens a bit instead.

Papers rustle faintly as she lays her proposal down.  She'll be eligible for her SeeD test soon although she really doesn't want to take it and we both know it.  This is all for her father's sake.  But Rinoa will never be a killer and everyone's happy with that, especially me.  Her face twists in a slight frown and it takes me a second to realize that she wants a response.

"Yes," I murmur after a moment.

She stares at me silently when I don't say anything else and soon the clock on the wall is the only sound in the room.  Her eyes soften in that peculiar way of hers that makes her indescribably beautiful to me and she exhales slowly, her lithe frame settling back into the comfortably functional chair across from me.

"Really?"  Her voice is so soft that I might have missed it if I hadn't been staring at her.  

"Yes," I say in the exact same tone.  Soft.  Flat.  Empty.  As though there were nothing more to the word or to all the other words I never say to her.  And there _is nothing more to what I do and do not say to her.  Because there's nothing there._

That's solely my fault and we both know it.

She shifts and I can feel her unease batter against my mental walls.  Time between us has somehow become a solid, physical thing these past few months.  We fight, we argue . . . Or rather she fights and argues at me and I just watch her until she burns herself out.  It's not because I don't care about her; I honestly do.  She's my sorceress and, even if she were to relieve me of that duty, that would be irrevocable to me.  So long as I'm alone, I have her.  I _need her._

I'm not angry at her.  I'm not annoyed or cross with her for any specific reason.  

She's just . . . no longer worth the effort of speaking to.

Maybe I am angry at her.  Just a little.  She shouldn't have said those things to me that morning—not then.  Not in front of the whole student body.  Not on that day of all days.

Rinoa's not a genius, but she's not stupid either.  She knew better.  She wanted to make me angry.  I knew it then and I know it now—she told me as much.  She wanted me to _react.  And I did.  I don't think I've ever seen her so frightened since I've met her.  She had good reason to be._

"How was the mission?"  Her voice reminds me of feathers.  My poor, sweet, beautiful Rinoa—delicate as a feather.

"Fine."

"Was everything okay?  You were all alright?"

"Yes."

"Oh . . ." She trails off and the conversation begins to drift listlessly again.  Her energy, the sparkle that flashed throughout her words when she speaks to me, vanished months ago.

Rinoa pushes her hair needlessly out of her face and sighs quietly.  "Did you have sex with Irvine?"

I freeze.  ". . . What?"

She blinks calmly and looks so terribly sad and small that for a moment I feel a twinge of shame at my utter inability to surrender to this woman.  I look down at the impeccable finish of my desk instead of at her.  Looking at Rinoa too much makes my head hurt lately.

"He came to my room last night and . . ." she trails off and I feel a chill overtake me, freezing my tongue and making me feel nauseous.  "It's okay if you did, you know," her ashy soprano voice continues.  "I don't mind.  I understand . . . with everything."

"I didn't," I mutter at the reflective redwood.  She waits for me to continue.

I raise my eyes to her and desperately wish that some emotion, some expression, would bleed through my body and let her know how important it was that she understand this.  "I . . . wouldn't do that.  You know that."

Her eyes flash briefly with anger and her tone hardens.  "But he knows?"

I settle back in the chair.  Yes.  He knows.  But not what you think.  Irvine is an observer . . . Even though he didn't know me that well back then, he could probably tell when they found me.  I was so sure they all knew . . . But only Irvine knows _that secret.  Attentive Irvine, always watching with his glowing sea-violet eyes.  I suddenly don't want to talk about the cowboy—there's too much danger in that.  "I don't see how.  We . . . talked."_

She snorted, a surprisingly indelicate sound.  "Then he knows."  

My eyes narrow dangerously and I can feel a glare edging its way onto my frigid features.  I make no effort to conceal the ice in my voice.  "You don't know what you're talking about."

My sorceress laughs bitterly.  "He's all you can think of."  She doesn't dare say his name in front of me—not after last time.  "You call for him in your sleep—_when you sleep, you don't eat, you don't go out, you don't __talk . . . All you do is work.  Work and kill things."_

"I'm a mercenary.  That's my job."

Her eyes narrow and for an instant she looks as though she wants to reach across and smack me.  This is not the Rinoa I thought I could love 18 months ago.

My fault.

"You're a love-sick puppy that's been kicked one too many times."  And _then comes the old Rinoa, complete with the shimmer of tears on the edges of her eyelids.  I'm almost relieved.  "__Him, of all people!"_

"Enough."  I don't raise my voice.  I don't have to.

She twists uncomfortable in her comfortable chair for a moment before standing and stalking out of my office.  I don't watch her go.  

The papers on my desk have been piling up during my absence and, while I know that neither Cid nor Xu like me going out into the field, I suddenly wish that it had taken me longer to kill Hokitawa.  I wish that there had been a snag or a complication or _something.  _

I don't want to go to Esthar . . . To Laguna and Ellone.  I don't want to walk these halls and hear them echo with my own footsteps.  I don't want to be back to the mundane life of the Garden or to the mundane lives of my friends.  I want to pretend just a few moments longer.

But wishes don't come true and I am the High Commander of Belamb Garden, Slayer of Sorceresses.  

It's okay, though.  I'll be okay without him.  I'm trying real hard.  I'll be just fine by myself.

I have to be.

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	4. And Still the Dead Man Lay Dying

**Rip, Torn, Tumble**

**(_straight__ into me_****)__**

~ Vain  9.4.2002

*------------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~-------------*

I **do not own Squall Leonhart, Seifer Almsay or any of the other characters in the game _Final Fantasy VIII; they belong to _****Squaresoft and their respective creators.  The story and its concepts are mine. **

Please be forewarned that this story contains spoilers, yoai, shounen-ai, mature themes, and violence.  _Translation: stuff you won't see until you finish the game, fighting, swearing, angst, Seifer/Squall man-love, and a dab of NCS.  Get over it or go away.  _

The only profit I get from this is emotional satisfaction, so please **read and review.  Thank you.**

~Vain

*------------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~-------------*

**Chapter Three**

**And Still the Dead Man Lay Dying**

*---------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~----------*

**"And what is an angel but a ghost in drag?"**

- Stan Rice

_Of Heaven ~ 1983_

*------------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~-------------*

Sunrises in Esthar were beautiful.  Every morning (when he could be drug out of bed) Laguna would open the curtains in the Presidential Office and watch the burning red sun slide over the lip of the horizon.  He loved it and Kiros loved to watch him do it.  He looked beautiful sitting there, the morning light dancing over the contours and hollows of his face like a lover's kiss.  Every morning.  Every morning except this one.  This morning the curtains were draw and the office seemed dark, strange shadows pooling around the room in a way they never had before.  

Kiros' mouth was set in firm line as he stared at the young man perched on the edge of Laguna's desk.  Laguna sat next to him behind the desk doing paperwork as usual, looking for all the world as though there was nothing wrong and there was not an obvious psychopath beside him.  Sometimes he had to wonder just how sane his friend, sometimes-lover really was, but he was convinced that this was probably the most work the slim brunet had ever done in one sitting.  

Ellone sat on the opposite side of the couch from Kiros.  Whereas he had only been tied up, she was bound, gagged, and currently under the effects of Sleep.  Just one more thing to hurt that young man for . . . For his part, the man on the desk simply shifted languidly as though he had not been sitting in relatively the same position for the past seven hours.  

The slim woman who had accompanied him was hidden somewhere in the shadows, but Kiros could feel her gaze resting on him.  She was somewhere near Ellone, he knew, weapon no doubt in hand to sever the sleeping girl's neck the moment it appeared as though he was going to resist her  . . . friend?  Master?  Commander?  Lover?  Kiros wasn't sure, but he could tell that her loyalty was absolute.  

The man turned and smirked at the President of Esthar the way someone would smirk at a dull child right before they played a nasty trick on him.  Kiros' fingers itched to wrap around the boy-childe's neck and throttle him.  As though he sensed the impulse the man looked up and his expression took on a coarser edge.  "Think he'll come?"

Kiros' hands clenched and unclenched almost spastically and he barely resisted wiggling in his bonds again—it would do him no good.  The man had bound his hands in front of him so he could make sure the slight warrior did nothing suspicious and the knots may as well have been tied by Hyne herself—they weren't budging.  

One scream to call the guards.  That was all it would take.  One swift movement to knock that child down and grab Laguna.  One damn _breath.  That was all he needed._

And that was too much.  The boy had ordered him to sit too far away.  And he and the woman were far, far too close to the other two.  Laguna and Ellone would be dead before he was even standing up fully. 

"He'll come," Laguna answered for him.  He signed another paper calmly.  Kiros absently wondered if he had ratified the plan for the new sewer system yet.

The boy-childe grinned down at Laguna and looked amused.  "You really had better hope so, Mr. President."  His burning gaze flickered to Ellone and then to Kiros.  "For all our sakes."

Laguna put reached into the inbox and pulled out another report.  A thick one.  If one looked closely, one could see where he was tied to chair, but one couldn't tell that the chair had been bound to the floor and that Laguna's legs were tied to the chair legs.  He sighed sadly.  "I don't know what you hope to accomplish by this . . . taking away something he doesn't even want in the first place."

The man snorted and his hand clenched slightly around the hilt of his weapon.  "Shows what you know.  Trust me, he comes in here and sees me pointing my baby here at your pretty little head, he'll yield.  Leonhart's nothing if not dutiful and while he may not give you the time of day, he'll take a bullet for you without so much as a whisper if he thinks it's expected of him.  Boy probably hasn't made an independent decision since he was seven."  The man smiled unkindly.  "But you wouldn't know anything about all that, would you?  I mean, seeing as you dumped him quicker than you had him and all . . ."

Laguna's mouth tightened and his knuckles turned white as he gripped the report a bit tighter.  "You don't know what you're talking about—"

"Oh, but I do, Mr. President.  And I know that if Squall was anyone else, he'd have shot you where you stood.  And if I didn't need you right now, your innards would be redecorating the appallingly overdone gaudiness of the Presidential Office as we speak."  He clenched his hilt again as though he'd like to do just that.  "I know _everything about that because I was there.  I was there for every tear and you weren't.  And that just fucking kills you, doesn't it?" _

It took all of Kiros' self-control not to leap across the room and rip out the man's throat with his bare hands.  "You—"

He looked up sharply and his jade eyes narrowed.  "_You shut up.  This has nothing to do with you."_

The dark-skinned warrior opened his mouth, only to find a sharp dagger at his throat.  His eyes slid over to the woman who had materialized somewhere to his right.  If he expected her to speak, he was disappointed.

"I told you to shut up," the man said pleasantly.  "You would be smart to listen to me, seeing as I'm the one in control here."  

Kiros bit his tongue and dropped his head a fraction.  The knife vanished.

"Now then . . ." The man turned back to Laguna and smiled.  "You were saying how very well you know your son, Mr. President?"

Laguna's face tightened a bit.

"Oh, come now, Mr. President . . . You were saying?"

The brunet closed his eyes in defeat and Kiros didn't have to look up to know there were tears his friend's eyes.  The boy-childe laughed, a cruel, unreal sound that made him shiver.

"You know," their captor continued conversationally, "I should kill you right here for causing him so much pain.  For making him a killer.  You broke him long before I ever had the chance to . . ." He leaned forward and Laguna could smell the scent of him as he whispered in his ear: pine, and gun oil, and sparks.  "Two years ago I would have killed you in a heartbeat . . . Kinda funny, isn't it?"

"Not really," the older man said in a soft voice that sounded more like a groan.

The young man sat back and laughed again.  "Oh well.  It's just as well really.  You can't change the past.  Believe me, no one knows that better than I do."  He shifted again.  "You just better hope he comes, or you're all in for a world of hurt, Mr. President.  And I don't mean just you and your little friends . . ."

"Why are you doing this?" Laguna asked for what had to be the hundredth time since the young man had appeared in his office yesterday.

"Because I owe him, Mr. President," the man responded for the hundredth time.  "And because no one is ever allowed to hurt him again.

Kiros sighed and was surprised when it sounded like a muffled sob.

~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~

Squall sighed as they all filed into the room.  08:15.  They would be in Esthar's airspace in another 15 minutes or so.  That meant another 20 to the Palace.  Another 5 onto that until he had to face his father and Ellone.  All in all, that gave him forty minutes to breath.  Forty minutes . . . which would inevitably be filled with Zell, Quistis, and Selphie pushing, poking, and prodding at him, so damned determined to be right and "help" him.  Irvine and Rinoa understood at least.  They, he was certain, would at least leave him be.

Zell was the last one in the room.  He flopped down into a soft chair and put his feet up on the table, his quick blue eyes raking over the others in the room.  The entire "Sorceress Crew," as the student body had affectionately dubbed them (much to Squall's disgust), was present.  He quirked an eyebrow at Squall where he sat at the head of the table.  "What's up, baby?"

Squall didn't even think to look annoyed at the nickname.  "Laguna left several messages on my machine yesterday.  It appears that there is a problem in Esthar."

Selphie frowned and thoughtlessly reached for her absent nunchuckus at the mention of possible danger to her "Sir Laguna."  "What's wrong?"

Squall shrugged, a tiny rise and fall of his shoulders.  "He wasn't very specific.  All he said was that he needed all of us to come to the Palace to discuss it.  He hinted at needing to deploy multiple SeeDs, but he asked for all of us specifically by name."

Irvine whistled and adjusted his cowboy hat.  "That's a mighty lotta firepower he's callin' for . . . More problems from Lunar Cry yet, ya think?"

Squall shrugged again.  Whether it was because he didn't know or just didn't care was anyone's guess.  "We're to go to the Presidential Palace for a briefing and then we'll decide what to do then.  Xu, Nida, Morrison, and Setrialen, one of the new SeeDs, will be filling in here for us at Garden.  Quistis, Zell," he nodded to the two, "your classes will be covered.  Irvine, your sharp-shooting classes will be canceled temporarily."  The cowboy cursed.  "Rinoa, the situation has already been worked out with your instructors, but I'm afraid you'll have to make up an exam on appropriate usage of Draw in battle for your Field Tactics 309 course."

The girl nodded and Quistis made a sympathetic noise.  

Zell reached across table and patted her hand.  "Tough break.  That class was murder.  Dropped my whole average."  
  


"Because you skipped it to get in line early for hotdogs every week," Quistis responded almost smugly.  

Zell stuck his tongue out at her and Rinoa smiled.  Squall looked like he would rather be undergoing an amputation without anesthesia.  

Irvine tugged at the bill of his hat.  "When we leavin'?"

Steel gray eyes flickered over to him and for a minute Squall remained silent.  Then he sighed and pushed himself to his feet.  The others followed suit.  "As soon as we land, so I want everyone to meet me in the Garage in about 10 minutes.  Everyone get what you need and head down, ok?"

"Weapons?" Rinoa asked.

The Commander nodded.  "Weapons _and GF's.  Even if you don't like having them junctioned," his eyes flickered to Irvine, "I want them on your person where you can get them in less than three seconds, understand me?  We don't know what the situation is down there."_

He straightened slightly and saluted and they all snapped to attention in response.  The salute was flawlessly coordinated and Zell couldn't help but note how well Rinoa blended in with them now.  It seemed as though her first stumbling salute in Galbadia had happened 20 years ago, not two.

"Dismissed."

Amazing what could change in a year.  He'd be even more amazed to discover how much could change in an hour.

*------------~*~*~*~ --=-- ~*~*~*~-------------*


End file.
